What is true art? Asked Steven Leyba.
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“What is true art” is a problematic question…much more so than seeking the identification of art itself: in relation to the object, what is it about that object that exalts it above everydayness into its carrying the signature of human intentionality, and thus, the attachment of meaning to its frame. An object can have both intentionality and meaning and still not be art. So let’s take an object that has both intentionality and meaning, and make it beautiful…is it art then? Well, a wall clock can be all of these things, but it is most of the time not art, it’s a craft, though perhaps an artfully made craft. We are now thrown into the relative world of opinion, where there are no rules, only the spherical thoughts and proclamations of well intentioned individuals, both artist and not.
Henceforth, there is something extra that art needs to be art. It is this and only this: power. Art is a discourse, one whose identity is constantly changing due to the machinations of curators, critics, collectors, theoreticians, students, and artists themselves. The reality of art is a consensual reality within which all of these people often passively agree to a collective hallucination. It is inauthentic to say “art is this” or “art is that.” As is any discourse, the discourse of art, and thus its definition, is changing moment to moment.
Power as a concept has been articulated best by Nietzsche, and under his influence, the philosopher Michel Foucault went further. Foucault proposed a model for power by giving us an image: the Panopticon. The Panopticon is a multi-sided prison, shaped much like a hexagon or some such thing. At each side there is a prison cell, and at the top of the building there is a prison tower which cannot be seen by cells at the ground floor. Prisoners inhabit these cells, and they never know whether they are being watched or not. Therefore, there is no need of a guard since the prisoners police their own behavior. Such as it is with discourse…I am a mental patient because of psychiatric discourse. I am an artist because I am shaped by the discourse of art. Under the watchful eyes of those that shape the discourse of art, I respond to art as a discourse and modify my own behavior, whether that means accepting the publicly sanctioned truth of art or rejecting it. Even those that supposedly define the discourse of art are shaped by it; the power of art transcends its discursive legions.
Truth in art lies in power. What art is, what art is “true”, is sanctioned by a schema of arbiters. Curators, critics, and collectors are the gate keepers. They decide whether a work of art is authentic, exciting, and worthy of exposure to a supposedly knowledge hungry public.
However, apart from this, how can we ask what true art is without getting lost in a sea of opinion? The answer is easy, but also harrowing. Foucault was asked once that since he believed that power was inescapable, how can one possibly transcend it? Predictably, he answered that it is impossible to escape power’s influence, but none the less, one must resist for resistance’s sake. It is the same for art I believe. The institution of art martials its power to fix the definition of what is “true” about art, and it is up to those who have been marginalized by it to step up and shake the foundations of said institution, even given the fact that all that they do will simply also be marginalized and incorporated into a new and “truer” art carcass. A professor of mine proclaimed that art school was a prison, thus equating professors with prison guards and students with prisoners. However, next to the prison lay a river, and it was the ever flowing and ever changing meaning of art…life giving and annihilating, as it is a river that can cleave through mountains. Even if all we can do is stare at the water through our prison bars, we can know that freedom exists out there somewhere, and that without our struggle it could never exist at all.
My friend, collaborator, and artist Steven Leyba has been interested in searching out a collective definition as to what art "is" by posing the question to an array of different practitioners. In his film What is Art? Inside the Mind of the Artist as They Speak the Truth, he interviews such legendary figures as David J of Bauhaus, Genesis P'orridge of Throbbing Gristle, and H.R. Giger. Check out the trailer below.
If you're interested, the film can be purchased here on DVD for $15. Steven will also be creating a book on the theme of what constitutes true art, and the above text is my submission to its collection of articles.
Reader Comments (1)
I often use water as an analogy, and in this essay the 'river' represents the romantic idea, that 'freedom' exists. A struggle for struggle's sake, but in the end - it doesn't exist. We will never be free of influence, and we rage against... the machine that attempts to assimilate us. In the case of 'art' , I oppose the idea that 'art' is determined by the critics, or even the collectors. Art, is in the creative process of the 'artist' - the creator. An artfully made clock, is reduced to a 'craft' as if 'craft' is the adolescent of 'true art'. I often create things I call my 'crafts' I generally use this term to describe the items which are not paintings, and sketches. I am imprisoned by the language of art.
'Craft' is generally used to describe some object that was made from other objects, that generally require some glue, a little paint, and some glitter. The adolescent, aspiring towards adulthood.
I have made clocks, my mother-in-law has a clock I made for her for mother's day many years ago. One day I viewed it in her kitchen, and my sister-in-law, who is a painter, had added hand-painted flowers to it, so it would match my mother-in-law's new color scheme in her dining room. Now it's art? The original piece was hand-carved, and embellished with water-colors to give it a rustic look. As much as she admired the gift, at some point she said to herself "This needs something 'more' " and asked my sister-in-law to add her 'artistic abilities to it. At one time I would look up to check the time, and admire what I had created. Now, I hate it, and one day when she's not looking I intend to take it down and destroy it. Destroy my 'craft'.
The language of art, has power. Power over the psyche and power over will. "Make me under the stars. Every man and woman is a star! Love is the law, love under will!" My passion for creating, isn't enough to change the language of art. My struggle isn't acquiring some romantic idea of 'freedom' but to force my hand, stick my finger deep within the tissue of the brain - and provoke change. Nothing can be changed, without first destroying it. I struggle to destroy the language of art, and change it in total.
Fuck your freedom!
Fuck your 'True Art!'
Fuck your 'Crafts'!
Fuck the language of Art!